Man to Run Half Marathon After Losing Nearly 400 Pounds

A Michigan man will run his first half marathon this weekend after giving up alcohol and losing 390 pounds over the course of the last two years, reports the Detroit Free Press. Brian Flemming will participate in Sunday’s Metro Detroit Chevy Dealers International Half-Marathon to raise funds in honor of the woman who he says helped save his life.

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Two years ago, Flemming weighed 625 pounds and had developed an alcohol problem. He was suffering from high blood pressure, depression, recurring cellulitis infections in his legs, and was borderline diabetic.

While playing the app game Draw Something in August of 2012, Flemming was randomly paired up with Jackie Eastham, a woman from London, England. The two gradually struck up a casual friendship, without revealing many details about themselves.

A couple of months later, Flemming and Eastham had grown close. Under stress related to his mother having her leg partially amputated, and fear that he was headed down the same path, Flemming confided in Eastham, telling her the whole story.

He expected sympathy, but got none, Flemming told the Free Press. “She said, ‘You’re pissing your life up the wall.’”

Eastham revealed to Flemming that she has myotonic muscular dystrophy, and that taking good care of herself was essential to keeping her symptoms under control.

Flemming’s exchanges with Eastham inspired him to quit drinking cold turkey. He made changes to his diet and started exercising. At first, he ran in place for five minutes, and gradually worked up to running in place for one hour.

He worked up the courage to start walking outside, he explained in a guest blog entry for Run Keeper. He built up his distance over time, eventually covering as much as 13 miles at a time. By the time he got down to 300 pounds, he was ready to try running. He built up to racing a 5K, and then a 10K.

Sunday’s race will be Flemming’s first half marathon, and he aspires to try a marathon one day. He will raise money for Myotonic Muscular Dystrophy research, in honor of Eastham.

To encourage others in their weight loss journeys, Flemming created the Facebook group “Team 383,” a nod to the amount of weight he had lost at the time of its creation. As of this writing, the group has more than 6,700 members.

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“There are tons of people out there dealing with the things I am dealing with,” Flemming told the Free Press. “If I tell my story, I might be able to give people hope that there’s always light at the end of the tunnel. It’s easy to lose hope, but who knows where fate or chance will take you. In my case, I think I won the lottery.”

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